Ship of Fools (Hardcover)

by Cristina Peri Rossi (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Review
"A stranger. Ecks. Estranged. Expelled..." For reasons we come to assume are political, thirty-odd-year-old Ecks can never go back to his unnamed country. Traveling, learning new streets, leaving again, he is an exile. In numerous short chapters prefaced by dreams, biblical quotes, and dream-like descriptions of an ancient tapestry, Ecks' wanderings are filled with ingenious descriptions, places with no names, and eccentric characters who share his intense soul-searching interest about their place in a confused and polluted world. We first meet Ecks on a ship with Chinese lanterns that, when darkened, "hang like forgotten trophies, lonely witnesses, spent fireflies." A gentle man to whom women are drawn, Ecks knows that "the best way for a foreigner to get to know a city is to fall in love with one of its women, someone inclined to mother a man far from home and also appreciative of different pigmentation. She will trace him a path that does not figure on any map and instruct him in a language he will never forget." And Ecks, the perennial foreigner, finds delightfully unusual women to guide him in what is ultimately a series of semi-related stories about sex and power. Reading this unconventional novel is a bit like floating on an unknown sea: wonderful, beautiful, and filled with surprising possibilities. -- For great reviews of books for girls, check out Let's Hear It for the Girls: 375 Great Books for Readers 2-14. -- From 500 Great Books by Women; review by Jesse Larsen --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Description
Sex and power are dominant themes in this innovative novel by a major femisnist writer, an exile from Uruguay now living in Spain. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 224 pages
• Publisher: Readers International (May 1989)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0930523539
• ISBN-13: 978-0930523534
• Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 5.5 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,478,845 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars The perplexing riddle of an experimental novel, May 29, 2008

By	D. Cloyce Smith (Brooklyn, NY) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

This review is from: Ship Of Fools (Paperback)

If there's anything that might scare away most readers, it's that shudder-inducing term "experimental novel." Even worse, perhaps, is an experimental novel in translation, and "Ship of Fools," Uruguayan writer Rossi's attempt to break down the structure of the novel and reinvent it as a prose medley, almost certainly suffers in its English retelling. Disjointed, self-referential, non-linear--it is all the things one expects from an experiment, yet it has moments of brilliance and humor that nearly compensates for its difficulty and occasional tedium.

"Difficulty" is probably the wrong word here; the prose style is fairly straightforward and most of it is fairly easy reading. Instead, the obscurity lies in trying to figure out exactly what Rossi is trying to accomplish. The exile Ecks (X?), wanders the world, exploring cities through the eyes of the women he meets, questioning the relevance of his own sexuality, and seeking the answer to the ultimate riddle: what is the greatest tribute a man can give to a woman? His friend Morris, trying to find a publisher for his "androgynous" book, instead finds his life's meaning in his love for a boy he encounters in a park. This barebones narrative thread, after a perplexing start and with frequent interruption, is Rossi's nod to a conventional story.

The novel at times resembles a travel journal interlaced with chapter-length footnotes, excerpts from fictional documents, descriptions of an artwork entitled "The Tapestry of the Creation," and references to the "Ship of Fools" legend. There is a fairly clever sketch about urban parochialism ("The principal preoccupation of the city's inhabitants is staring at their navels."), and an underlying theme is the anonymity and isolation of the metropolis (a woman walks through New York wearing a sign saying, "I'm very lonely. Please someone talk to me.").

Ultimately, though, Rossi's experiment in deconstructing the traditional form of the novel suffers from a lack of putting it all back together again. After collecting all the pieces, I'm still not quite sure what it all means: is it really just another exploration about the societal tension between sex and power? The peculiarly sympathetic depiction of pedophilia seems to undercut its feminist arguments about patriarchy (in society) and authoritarianism (in politics), and the answer to Ecks's riddle is disappointingly banal. It's a tightrope act between randomness and incoherence; like the kaleidoscope it resembles, "The Ship of Fools" is both beautiful and scattered.

5.0 out of 5 stars Phenomenal work which will challenge sophisticated readers, October 21, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Ship Of Fools (Paperback)

Cristina Peri Rossi's work is thought-provoking treatise on exile and isolation whose metaphor resonated with me. The language is sophisticated and engaging, while at the same time evocative of the sparseness and detachedness at the novel's core. This is an impressive work which has established the author as an important new voice, not only for those interested in Latin American literature or women authors, but for anyone interested in perspectives which push the envelope of the literary canon. If you are interested in being challenged, read this book